Bridges of Time (2018) - full transcript

As God created a man in his image...

I think that in the Bible

even the very first verse of Genesis says:

God created the heavens and the earth.

As I understand it,

Heaven is something ideal, spiritual,

Earth is something material.

And that's all, friends!

That is what we are doing
in documentary cinema!

We film the Earth, but we remember
that Heaven is above us.

We film the substance, the reality,



but always remember
there is spirituality too.

Where is my little tape recorder?

Too bad.

And now again...

Quite complicated.

If you want to get to angels,

you must struggle through
all kinds of stuff.

Never mind, soon I will...

Documentary filmmaker?s daily life.

Not bad at all.

Men go to the sea again,

women are waiting for them again.

Our main research object was man,

how he feels, who he is in general.



We studied them with all the resources
that were available to us.

We had a camera and time.

To look at or look closely into.

We had time,
we could look closely into it.

A shed must have been here.

There used to be a shed here,
this is the first shot.

Hold this folder for me, will you?
I start to look as a book-keeper.

Don?t lose anything.

It?s wide angle and a yard.

Anything could happen in the yard.

Thus we have a yard, because sheds
don?t express anything by themselves.

I?ll go and open that door,
then make a shot,

when the door is open,
and without me in the shot.

One panning sequence without me,
one panning sequence with me.

And perhaps a static shot with me.

Panning without me and simply
a static shot with me, and then...

So that it is possible
to edit stuff like that.

Destiny has decided otherwise.

Becomes a trick like in feature films.
Blimey!

There is nothing eternal,
only the changeability is eternal.

Before I made ?Woman of Kihnu?,

there was also the world
that had already disappeared,

and before that another one.

This disappearing world,
in which we live now,

will be replaced with new variations,
worlds with new people,

with new beliefs. That?s how it is.

We have to tolerate it.

A film box.
This is a very good box,

it is good to stand on it,

when the sticks need to be
hammered into the ground.

Another very good feature of it is

that when my mother who lives in town
orders liquid dung for her roses,

then it does not leak,
it's very good to carry.

And the third feature is that
you can put the film there.

In some boxes, the film is also inside.
Some are empty.

Some of the boxes have to be left empty,

they have some unfulfilled
dreams inside.

In the afterworld, I?ll hunt elks too.

I?ll keep on living as I live now.

And I?ll go deer hunting.

I?ll live as I lived before.

Someone told me that over there
life goes backwards,

that man becomes bigger or smaller.

Smaller, smaller!

And afterwards when you?re tiny,
when you have shrunk,

when you get as tiny
as the smallest mouse,

then your life is over.

Show me how small the man will become.

How small will the man be, show me!

How can I show?

Like this tiny mouse.

Show me again!

- A small mouse.
- What size?

Here, like this.

Like this cone. Like a cone.

Tiny like this mouse.

- Will the man get as small as that?
- As small as that.

- And will the cone fall out of his hands?
- That?s it.

That will be the end of his life.

It is not possible to make films
for future generations

or for those who'll live
after 100 years from now.

We don?t know how they'll think,

We don?t know how fast they'll think,
or what they'll be interested in.

People have always created art
for their contemporaries,

talking about the thoughts
and feelings that haunt you,

that are important to you,
to your community,

to your people or the entire world.

I believe it's like that.

Just like there is no absolute
darkness or light,

there is no absolute documentary.

What the hell!

There are no times that will vanish.

This very moment will stay forever.

The time that has emerged
will never disappear,

Even though our senses
can?t grasp its permanence.

How are values born?

A man goes beyond the bounds
of old beliefs.

Sea and sand grow apples
when man wants it.

There was just sandy and empty land

and we can see an old man

pushing a trolley full of seaweed
along the beach.

He brought the seaweed here
and planted the trees.

It seemed so hopeless
and meaningless to us,

because no apple tree
would grow in the sand.

But behold, it still did!

Anyway, it was poetic, as there
was a man and nature and...

You are doing something that seems
pointless to any bystander.

Talk to me, boys!

What is it you are starting
all over again?

All over again?

Life. Always life.

All over again...

As we grow old,
we become infantile.

I'm returning to my childhood.

Back to this tiny...

The smaller I was,
the more fun I had.

This is all I earned during my life.

I don't even know what to start from.

I wanted to move it,
but look who's there.

It's been so many years now,
but this question ?

why me, why not some other child?

This I don't understand up to this day.

Maybe it's my fate. I don't know.

Today is the 1st of September.

We are starting a new school year.

Four new pupils have arrived
at our school.

You will be called first graders.

This year, we will learn to write,
to draw, to read and to sing.

Or maybe you have already learned
it at home.

Kishkyte Vale.

Do you know how to read?
Do you know the letters?

- No.
- Fine, you will learn here.

Maybe you know a poem or a song?

A poem.

Do you know a poem?
Would you like to recite it to us?

Shameless bear, don't sit on the bike.

You've forgotten
how to tootle and to drive.

I watched the film

when I was forty.

It was a birthday present
from my husband.

I cried a lot.

It touched my heart.

The film is so precious,
because everyone is still alive there.

My mum is still young and alive...

And all the neighbours.

The meaning of life is
searching for the meaning of it.

The very life, and the act of seeking
for its meaning.

And happy is that man,
who has the id?e fixe,

that the meaning of life exists.

He seeks for it, makes mistakes,
finds it.

But it is like God - a myth.
No one knows what it is.

But the meaning exists.
Living without the meaning...

A person becomes degraded.

Of course, drinking isn't
the meaning of life.

Drink this, and you'll live
for another 100 years.

- How much longer do you want to live?
- I don't want to.

You don't?

She doesn't want to. Why don't you?

I'm bored of it.

Old age. She no longer wants to live.

One needs to live

passionately

and to make an effort

to live more or less honestly.

At least in personal matters.

And that's all.

The very best musician
is my son Pranas.

He teaches in Vedarai.

He first learned to play the harmonica,
then he got himself an accordion.

So now he has assembled a band.

There are eight of them.
They tour the festivals.

One thing - you mustn't be deaf
if you want to play.

Once I became deaf,
I could no longer hear...

I don't hear the...

The trebles are still fine,
but the basses...

They get mixed, and I can't play.

So I dropped it.

It has been five or more years
since I've touched it.

Now it's... You see, when not played,
music decays.

It won't...

Nothing good.

It's out of tune. It's decaying.
And my voice is getting weaker.

So to speak, it is all dying.

Music cannot be motionless.

Now, we will all sing together.

Three, four...

I have not entirely fulfilled
my creative potential.

I am taking away with me a lot
of very good unaccomplished ideas

no one else will ever bring to life.

Maybe they will bring to life
the same ideas, and do it even better,

but they won't do it
with the same feeling,

and the individual approach to the film
as an artwork

that is specific to me.

I have felt it through.

I would now only need to accomplish it.

Time...

The flux of time...

It changes a lot of things.

And what seems unshakable, majestic
and never-ceasing...

Appears to gradually change.

You couldn't even understand why.

Is there a meaning in filmmaking?

But what is it? Is there a meaning?

Is there a meaning in building a house?
Or growing a tree?

Or raising children?

You can?t ever know.

When you are fully involved
in doing it...

It seems there is a meaning in it.
That it needs to be done.

The world falls asleep.

Men?s hands lie on wives? shoulders

and on the launching buttons
of intercontinental missiles.

And in a house in Latvia,
in the middle of the forest

a man reads a newspaper

and thinks.

That is Imants, a trawler?s captain.

This summer he turned 29.

I was born two years before the last war.

I have two sons.

I smoke two packs of Prima per day.

Agris!

The door is open. Here he is!

This is Agris, the one
who was in that film.

The little boys have gone grey.

Grey ? everyone goes grey.

Gray colour now is in fashion.

Through the holes of our nets

a rich world runs through,

the sea runs through, stars run through,

only fish remain.

Herring and only herring
are poured into our boxes.

Weren?t we supposed to catch
the silvery salmon?

We are two twin ships

bringing up catch from the depths.

Ships rope holds us together...

Where are you going?

Party is not over yet!

...for the sake of that salmon.

That will do.

That?s enough, I start getting ashamed.

Let?s go home! It was good
when I came and stared.

How much can you use of that ?
a little shot.

Now he leaves with sombre music.

Aivis! Dinner is ready!

Come, son, dinner is ready!

I have passed away once,
I have even been... dead,

but awake once again.
One time I had a ...

I had a beautiful dream.

In a huge hangar

there was placed some kind of obstacle

shaped like a loaf of bread.

Made of stone.

It was a bit bigger than this whole room.

And perfectly polished and clean.

And like a mountaineer
I had to climb on top of the loaf,

and there was only a small dent
where I could possibly put my foot

and climb up with my sports shoes.

I climb and climb and a girl
reaches out her hand to me

and helps me to climb up.

A pretty girl.

Well, it moved me so much
that I forgot...

It was so beautiful!

Extremely beautiful.

The air up there...

Incomparable beauty, simply incredible.

In the beginning God created the heavens
and the earth, and the earth was void

and the Spirit of God
was soaring above the water.

Somehow with these first feelings

of global perception of the world...

When at the age of five I was taken
to this melamed, to this teacher,

and we studied the first words
of the Bible

that in the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth,

and the earth was void and so on,

my perception of the world has changed
very little since then.

Afterwards I even thought that...

and in the film "Flashback"
I am talking about it too,

that I was somehow born sad,

with some feeling of grief
and I don?t know why.

It stayed with me during my entire life.

But my perception of the world
changed very little.

And this feeling of loneliness
in this world

I?ve had since my childhood.

I think that all the films
that I made since,

they still are endowed with the warmth

of some sort of cosmic feelings
of human life.

We will all pass away,

and become like water spilt on the ground

that cannot be collected any more.

Perhaps not everything will be spilt,

maybe some dewdrops will remain.

And this quiet sough of wind.